In Europe, Bucharest (50%) knocked Moscow (44%) off last year’s top spot, with Saint Petersburg (41%), London (40%) and Marseille (40%) making up the top five.
North America’s top five most congested cities remained the same as the previous year – Mexico City (66%), Los Angeles (45%), San Francisco (39%), Vancouver (39%), New York (35%) – although congestion levels were up across the board.
Congestion Up, Globally
Looking at TomTom’s historical data, traffic congestion is up by 23% globally since 2008. But, interestingly, there are shocking differences between continents. Between 2015 and 2016, while North America’s traffic congestion has only increased by 5%, Europe’s has increased by 9%. Asia and Oceania are both up by 12%, while South America is up 7%, and Africa, by 15%. That’s a global rise of 10% on 2015.
Ralf-Peter Schaefer, VP TomTom Traffic, said: “TomTom’s mission is to transform mobility across the world, helping to create the smarter cities of the future. A big part of this transformation is to help everyday drivers to make better decisions about how they get around. This is where our expertise in traffic comes in, and it’s why we release the TomTom Traffic Index every year. It’s designed to help drivers, cities and transport planners to understand traffic congestion and, most importantly, how to reduce it.”
People can find out more about the TomTom Traffic Index, and discover where their home city ranks at www.tomtom.com/trafficindex. There’s also helpful advice on beating traffic congestion. For the first time, this year, TomTom is celebrating those cities that deserve special recognition for their efforts to beat traffic congestion with the introduction of the TomTom Traffic Index awards.
Six cities have been chosen for special recognition by an international panel of traffic experts. Each expert nominated three cities and subsequently all experts voted to determine the award winning cities from the nominated cities. Winners include Moscow, Stockholm and Rio de Janeiro. The full list of winners can be found here: www.tomtom.com/trafficindex/awards.
Ranking of the most congested cities in Europe in 2016 (Overall daily congestion level – extra travel time – population over 800,000):
| 1 | Bucharest | 50% | 6 | Rome | 40% | ||||||||
| 2 | Moscow | 44% | 7 | Paris | 38% | ||||||||
| 3 | Saint-Petersburg | 41% | 8 | Brussels | 38% | ||||||||
| 4 | London | 40% | 9 | Manchester | 38% | ||||||||
| 5 | Marseille | 40% | 10 | Athens | 37% |
